


this is home

by starforged



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Gen, Not Canon Compliant, Spoilers for 803, Stark Babies Family Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2019-05-07
Packaged: 2020-02-27 12:14:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18738811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starforged/pseuds/starforged
Summary: “I should have been here,” Jon says.She isn’t sure for which part he means, but she agrees. Her smile is thin as she turns to him, chin tilted. “You never listen to me.”“I listen. I’m just as stubborn as you.”“We didn’t need him,” another voice chimes in. Arya moves like a ghost now, but Sansa has learned to stop being startled by it. “He would have been too noble about Littlefinger.”





	this is home

It seems absolutely ridiculous, but her nerves are shot, her ancestors clawed their way out of the tombs they had been placed in, and she is so wired that Sansa Stark doesn’t believe she’ll ever sleep again. But that’s fine, she’s used to sleepless nights. She pulls out a long-forgotten needlepoint, threads her needle by the fire roaring, and begins to spear her fabric without thought.

She wishes that fighting had come that easily to her. That she could have done more in the crypts, that she could have used Arya’s gift with the same kind of precision as her needles. 

She doesn’t bother to look up when Jon finally comes stumbling in, shaking the snow from his hair, absent one queen. Good. There’s no part of Sansa that wishes to play hostess right now. Her brother pulls up a chair beside her, one of the only ones not broken from when the dead got into the manor. He shucks off his gloves and lets them fall to the floor. He smells of blood. 

“Didn’t you start that particular piece before I left?” he asks her, voice so quiet, it could get lost in the wind.   


She glances at him quickly, hands still moving. “There were other matters to attend to besides foolish girl’s work.”

Half a wolf fills her fabric, and she intends to now add all of them. The dead, the living. It’s the pack, hers. 

“You leaving, Arya and Bran returning, the replacement of Littlefinger,” Sansa continues. “Feeding the people, homing them.”  


“I should have been here,” Jon says.  


She isn’t sure for which part he means, but she agrees. Her smile is thin as she turns to him, chin tilted. “You never listen to me.”

“I listen. I’m just as stubborn as you.”  


“We didn’t need him,” another voice chimes in. Arya moves like a ghost now, but Sansa has learned to stop being startled by it. “He would have been too noble about Littlefinger.”  


She sits next to Sansa on the floor, her head resting against Sansa’s knee. She also smells of blood and dirt and sweat. A million years ago, this never would have happened. Arya wouldn’t have come this close to Sansa, and Sansa would have been too nervous about her clothes being dirtied or if Arya was up to her no good tricks. Now, she takes comfort in having her sister with her again.

Jon leans forward in his chair to look at her. “Pageantry isn’t my style.”

“It wasn’t Father’s either, but I’m sure he would have enjoyed it all the same,” Sansa quips.   


“I enjoyed it. Fewer names to repeat at night.”  


Sansa doesn’t say anything about that, and Jon thankfully doesn’t either. He’s leaned back in his chair again, head tilted up to look at the ceiling. 

The siblings are quiet. She keeps stitching, nice and neat little lines that make sense. A foolish girl’s pride and joy, but there’s still bits and pieces of her inside. Somewhere deep, where the darkness can’t touch her. Needlepoint makes her think of her mother, and the comfort of being in her arms. 

She should have never left home.

Never left her mother or her sister or her brothers. 

There are things that can’t ever quite be changed, though. 

“Is Bran alright?” Sansa breaks the silence that settled over them as peacefully as snow.   


“Define what you mean by alright,” Arya replies.  


That’s - a fair point. Sansa jerks her leg, bumping her sister. “You know what I meant.”

“He’s safe,” Jon promises.   


There’s part of her that wonders, now that there is no threat, no darkness versus the long memory, will Bran return? _Can_  Bran return? Or are they to live with the Three-Eyed Crow forever? 

When she makes Bran, there will be a crow on top a wolf. He is both, and he is neither. 

“And…” The words stick in her mouth, her tongue dry and glued to the roof of her mouth. She takes a deep, soft breath. “Theon?”  


“I took him to the crypts,” Arya says. “Seemed right.”  


A heaviness that is both relief and overwhelming grief settle over Sansa like a bride’s cloak. It’s right, but he should be here. With them. In this broken room with the broken Starks.

Arya leans her head back on Sansa’s thigh, staring up at her. It’s an odd look, uncomfortable at best. Her face is blank, but her eyes more expressive than usual. Maybe that’s what bothers Sansa about it, like something inside of Arya has changed. 

“You’re filthy,” she mutters.  


“You smell like shit,” Arya shoots back.  


They grin at each other, a little wild, a little forced. Jon’s mouth twists into a lopsided grin, brows drawn together as if he isn’t quite sure if he’ll be breaking up a fight or not. 

This is how Sansa wants it to always be. The three of them, the four of them, together, barely threaded together. Her heart thumps in her chest with a quickening beat, and she can feel the sting behind her eyes. This is home, and this is family, and they are alive. 

They are _alive._


End file.
